


A Little Time to Think Things Over

by bluespring864



Category: The Voice (US) RPF, The Voice RPF
Genre: Alternate Universe, Developing Relationship, First Time, M/M, Self-Discovery, both single in 2017
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-07-08
Updated: 2018-07-08
Packaged: 2019-06-07 10:13:57
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 18,361
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15216935
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/bluespring864/pseuds/bluespring864
Summary: Blake has perfected denial. But then a certain someone lets it all come crashing down, without even trying.Blake searched for a way to dislodge that ache, by now firmly settled in his chest.A beer or five might help.Temporarily.





	A Little Time to Think Things Over

**Author's Note:**

> Right, so I fell in love with those two guys and their music, and wrote this instead of finishing stories for my other fandoms. 
> 
> A few quick notes: I've recently talked to people who realized their sexuality later in life, and was pretty fascinated by that idea, so I found myself revisiting that topic for this fic. As always, the story did what it wanted and not what I wanted... I hope it's not too soppy.  
> Timeline-wise, this takes place right before, during and after the blinds for season 14 of the Voice, both are single here (Blake twice-divorced), and regarding family members etc. I used info that was easily accessible, but did not poke around for it if I couldn't find it, so a lot of that is completely made up.  
> Also, I haven't seen the Angry Birds movie, there might be inaccuracies concerning that ;-), and, for the record, I can't keep up with Adam's hairstyle, so I just chose something that suited me for the story.
> 
> Title from "I want to know what love is" by Foreigner, because I listened to Chloe Kohanski's stunning version several times while writing this, and it fit.

Blake Shelton was nine years old when he decided he couldn’t be gay.

It was not that, around him, people expressed hatred of gay people, not at all. Nothing like that, at least not in his family.

They did something that might have been worse: they pitied them.

When he was nine, Blake heard his aunt Mary say: “Oh, the poor darling”, referring to some neighbor who, according to his mum, had just ‘come out’ as ‘gay’.

Now Blake, at nine years old, didn’t really know what either of these words meant, but he knew one thing: he hated to be pitied. Some children took comfort in a little pity when they were hurt, or sick, or whatever. Not Blake. Oh, how he hated it. The looks, the smiles, the tone of voice.

No, Blake couldn’t be gay.

So he asked his Mum what that actually meant. She, to her credit, Blake remembered many years later at a bit of a low point in his life, when he was trying to find someone to blame for his misery, didn’t freak out about her boy asking that kind of question. Didn’t try to find out why he was asking, even. Just explained calmly that it meant a boy loving a boy, or a girl loving a girl.

“You mean, ‘love’, like, getting-married-love?”

Her smile had looked a bit pained when she answered.

“Yes, honey, like that. Only, gay people can’t get married right now.”

Well, his decision held firm then. Blake didn’t know much about the future, but he knew that he would get married one day.

Of course he would.

 

There was a boy in his class that year who nearly tempted him to rethink his decision. A boy who grinned at him so happily that Blake had to grin back. A boy whose laugh he heard from across a room. A boy who could sing like nobody’s business.

And if there was one thing that Blake loved more than anything, it was music.

But no, he told himself, very seriously, as sometimes only a nine year old can be serious. You won’t love this boy.

A year and a half or so later, Blake began to notice Sandy, cute and blonde with a ponytail, and, crucially, female, and all he felt was relief.

Only thing was, over the years, there weren’t that many girls that caught his eye. The description ‘far and few between’ might have already been embellishing things.

So he married the second one towards whom he felt more than a passing attraction. The one after Sandy. There had been such a gap between falling in love for the first and second time that he’d really started to worry.

Well, that went well.

And he didn’t fare too much better with the third. Fourth, if he counted a one-month girlfriend he still wasn’t sure he had truly loved or only told himself to feel something for – because everyone thought her beautiful – so often that it seemed true for a while.

Blake didn’t know how many boys he had purposefully not noticed over the years, but he certainly had a lot of memories of looking away, to the floor, into his glass of beer, et cetera.

That was the way to deal with strangers.

If it happened to be a friend, or someone he worked with, he had learned early on that ignoring them wasn’t the way to go. People got angry about that.

So – preferably after making sure the guy in question was straight – Blake applied the exact opposite technique. He became over-affectionate. He kissed, he touched, he flirted, he payed the most outrageous compliments if he felt like it. Because once he was close, he couldn’t for the life of him keep any kind of distance at all.

Funnily enough, that worked out just fine.

He got a bit of a reputation as a joker, a clown. Sometimes, people even saw him as somebody who was confident enough in his own sexuality to not hold back on friendly affection. And, over time, that became true to some extent. Blake had conditioned himself to turn a spark of desire into a spark of friendship – where other people often desperately wanted to get out of the ‘friend-zone’, Blake, in his own peculiar way, worked to firmly stay in it, so much so that he actually managed to tone down his feelings. Like putting some kind of dampener on them.

And then came Adam.

Adam, who laughed at his jokes, and sometimes mocked him for them, Adam, who joked back just as outrageously, Adam, who was simply such an all-around great guy that Blake told himself he was glad he had him at his side in a stable friendship, and not in a volatile romantic relationship (somehow, they were always volatile, weren’t they?).

But there was also the Adam who, as comfortable as they were with each other, seemed dangerously perceptive sometimes. Adam, who appeared to notice, with a little frown, there and gone, blink and you might miss it, but, damn it, it had been there a second ago, that something wasn’t quite like it seemed. Adam, who, just for that second, looked uncomfortable. Or pensive. Or something. (For the most part, Blake refused to name the ‘something’.)

God, he was scared.

And oh, wasn’t that more thrilling than almost anything.

 

~---~

 

“Blake.”

“…”

“Blaaaake. Hey, man, are you comin’, or what?”

Adam sounded annoyed that he’d been ignored. Blake could understand that – he didn’t usually ignore Adam. Ever.

But he was… oh hell, it was so stupid. He had to get over it, why was he so hung up on…

Adam had been humming and singing one of Blake’s songs during the taping breaks. Just quietly, under his breath. Subconsciously even, it seemed. The thrill of discovering it had shot right through Blake.

He needed to make it stop, right away, but he’d been a bit lost for words at that moment. So he simply raised meaningful eyebrows at Adam as soon as their looks happened to cross.

Instead of stopping, however, Adam broke out into a broad grin when he realized what he’d been doing. The melody of ‘Don’t make me’ - oh, and why did it have to be that one, and where had he even heard it, old thing that it was –  had stayed on Adam’s lips, making Blake’s heart ache.

_< I can’t find the place your heart is hiding…>_

Even now, as Blake trotted along after him, having confirmed that he was indeed coming to that fancy bar Adam wanted to go to tonight for pre-blinds-drinks, Kelly and Alicia already waiting at the door, Blake searched for a way to dislodge that ache, by now firmly settled in his chest.

A beer or five might help.

Temporarily.

“Woah there, buddy, how about you slow down a bit?”

Blake looked up from beer number five, already almost three quarters empty half a minute after Adam had put it down in front of him, and narrowed his eyes in a stare he knew would come off as intense and maybe even slightly frightening (that’s what people told him sometimes when they asked him to tone it down a little for photoshoots and such, in any case.)

Adam did not look intimidated.

Adam looked kind of sad, and, fuck, a few glasses of beer didn’t exactly immunize against that gaze. Rather the opposite.

There was no way Blake could keep looking at him.

He found nothing to say, either.

And he flinched when a hand settled heavily on his shoulder. Luckily, Adam wasn’t deterred. The warm, comforting weight stayed. Not quite so luckily, Adam asked,

“What did I do wrong?”

_No matter how wrecked he sounds, don’t look at him._

“Nothin’.”

“Man, don’t… don’t give me that bullshit.”

Despite the words, there was the hint of a smile in Adam’s voice by the end of the sentence.

“Or bullcrap, if you prefer.”

Blake snorted and looked up in spite of himself.

It hit him there, in this way too fancy, way too well-lit L.A. bar, after four and a half beers that had failed to make him drunk.

That man, right there in front of him, with a sweet little grin on his face but serious eyes, with the latest iteration of an ever-changing hairstyle, with those too fuckin’ fine and handsome features, and, crucially, with that something in his eyes that Blake refused to name – that man was… indispensable.

Not having him around didn’t bear thinking about and – _and you wouldn’t mind having him a whole lot closer._

_Oh._

_Oh shit. No, don’t think ‘bout it._

_He’s also still waiting for an answer, by the way._

_Well, then. If you want to lie, keep it close to the truth._

“I just… I’ve got something on my mind right now. Not your fault that I’m being a bit skittish because I’m all lost in thought, ‘kay?”

“All right.”

The hand on his shoulder squeezed, and Blake watched, mesmerized, as the muscles of Adam’s bare arm flexed with the movement.

Oh, he was fucked.

“Better to call it a night, I guess,” he murmured into his glass. Alicia and Kelly had left a while ago already.

“Yeah, that might be a good idea. I got the kids tomorrow. The whole weekend, actually.”

That pulled Blake out of his morose introspection real fast.

“You what now?”

But Adam, the unhelpful little fucker, just repeated,

“I’ve got the kids.”

A minute ago, Blake had been sure he was pretty sober. Not so sure now.

“Whose kids, Adam?”

Damn it, his voice came out a bit strangled.

Adam had the gall to look amused.

“Relax, Shelton. Julia and Greg are here for a few days, and want some time to themselves.”

Okay. Okay. But Adam had definitely done that on purpose. The bastard.

“So your sister deems you responsible enough to look after two young, impressionable children? Really?”

“Asshole.”

The reply came instantly, but with so much fondness in that beloved voice that Blake was right back at the issue he was trying so desperately to avoid.

Damn it all to hell.

 

~---~

 

“You’re here.”

Adam sounded surprised, but also more than a little stressed, so Blake let it slide.

_Yes, I’m here, you idiot. You were stupid enough to invite me over, and I like kids. And you. I really like you, for some reason._

The sniffling boy on Adam's hip, perhaps four years old, cute and blond with huge eyes, squinted upwards.

“Who’re you? You’re really tall.”

“Yeah, that’s Big Country,” Adam said the same time Blake said, “Blake”.

“Big Country isn’t a name,” the boy decided correctly, making Blake grin.

Half an our later, the little one – ‘Lukash, but please call him Luke, it annoys the hell out of Julia’ – was sitting on Blake’s shoulders, cackling madly every time he managed to touch the ceiling with his tiny hands.

“Thank God,” Adam had whispered, “he threw a right temper tantrum crying for his mum up until you arrived.”

In contrast to Luke, his sister was acting the part of the elder sibling admirably. She screwed up her nose at Blake’s and Luke’s antics (though Blake suspected that, deep down, she would have liked to participate), and only looked up briefly from the watercolor painting she was doing on a large sheet of paper on the floor.

“Hi. I’m Alissia. I’m seven. You are Blake.”

It wasn’t a question, but Blake nodded, and asked,

“How come you know me, then, Alissia?”

“My mom lets me watch The Voice sometimes, for a bit. You’re funny. And Adam talks about you all the time.”

Blake’s head shot up fast enough to catch the widening of Adam’s eyes and the reddening of his cheeks. He answered Blake’s delighted grin with a rude gesture that Luke promptly tried to copy.

“Oh sh… crap,” Adam murmured, and Blake burst into laughter.

Man, it felt good to laugh after the mostly sleepless night he’d spent thinking gloomy thoughts.

The day progressed in much the same vein – Blake and Luke horsing around, sometimes joined by Adam and Alissia. Blake laughed for what seemed like hours when Alissia managed to talk Adam into braiding her dark locks. The best part of it was watching Adam try to prevent himself from cursing when stubborn strands of hair tangled or escaped, ruining his progress. But after a few tries, he actually got pretty good at it, Blake had to admit.

Adam cooked Spaghetti for lunch, and Blake admired him greatly for getting both kids to eat in a more or less orderly fashion, with hardly any tomato stains on clothing (‘Crap’, Blake murmured when his own checkered shirt wasn’t so fortunate – at least the red squares hid it well).

They were already taking in suggestions for a movie before bedtime – “Could you please check if ‘Toy Story’ is on Netflix”, Adam was saying, handing his phone over to Blake, ready to run after an increasingly hyper Luke – when the doorbell rang in the late afternoon.

It was Julia, who seemed quite surprised to see her kids content and Adam still mostly alive, and who threw a curious look or three at Blake.

“Oh, I forgot to tell you I invited Blake over yesterday,” Adam mumbled, and Blake hastened to add,

“You see, we’re starting taping on Tuesday, so I didn’t have time to go home to Oklahoma in between. And then I have nothing better to do on the weekends…”

Julia smiled a bit too widely, and added an “I see” of her own, that made Blake wonder uncomfortably what exactly she was seeing.

She dropped off a few snacks for dinner (‘see to it that they eat at least a handful of carrots and tomatoes each, would you?’), declared that they seemed to have everything well in hand, and left again for her own dinner with her husband.

Adam looked somehow nervous and jittery now, and Blake only refrained from a reassuring hug because there were two little spies watching all of their interactions.

“Sorry, no Toy Story. But the Angry Birds movie’s on Netflix,” he said instead.

Wow, that eyeroll was something to behold.

“You only want to watch that one because you did the song for it. Admit it, Blake.”

“I also voiced…”

“…that stupid green pig with the Cowboy hat.”

Oh, that was too good to be true.

“You watched it?”

“Nah, only a bit of it. Had to see if there was any potential for making fun of you.”

Alissia and Luke were following their discussion with interest and Blake decided it was high time for dinner.

They watched the Angry Birds movie afterwards. Luke was asleep after the first twenty minutes, but Alissia fought valiantly to stay awake till the end, even going so far as to shush Blake and Adam for whispering stupid comments about the characters and ignoring the plot.

At a quarter to nine, Blake carried Luke to bed, and Adam sent Alissia off to brush her teeth. She grumbled the whole way about Luke needing to brush his teeth, too, but neither Adam nor Blake were up for waking him again.

A quarter of an hour later, they were alone in Adam’s enormous living room. It looked way too big without the kids in it, in any case.

“You stayin’, then?”

Blake was bone-tired. He really hadn’t slept all that much last night – and the topic he’d been thinking on had been exhausting, to say the least.

“Guess so.”

He slumped back into the couch. Adam, who’d been shooting him assessing glances throughout the day, clearly noticing that all was not like it seemed, looked like he desperately wanted to ask what was going on, but didn’t really dare after yesterday’s non-answer. In the end, he just vanished for a minute, came back with two beers from the fridge and sat himself down beside Blake.

The couch had a dent in it from where they’d all sprawled earlier in a big heap, the two kids in the middle, and it moved Adam closer from where he’d sat down, their shoulders bumping.

“I’m having some kind of identity crisis,” Blake said into the half-darkness of the room, lit only by the TV and a floor lamp – a strange, round, white, designer thing.

He didn’t move away from Adam.

Adam didn’t pull away either. He just hummed a quiet, “Mhmm?”

“Hm. Yeah. I…”

_Come on, man, you made your decision yesterday. And it was long overdue._

“I…”

_But then, shaking off thirty years of ingrained behavior was apparently not all that easy. Who knew._

“I’m at least eighty percent gay.”

 _There_. That was that.

He stared straight ahead, even as he felt Adam turn towards him. His mind was spinning out of control, but totally blank at the same time, his stomach churned – wasn’t saying it out loud supposed to make you feel better?

Then, Adam hugged him, and it really did feel better.

His face muffled by speaking into Blake’s shirt, sending a point of warmth blooming close to Blake’s collarbone, Adam chuckled,

“At least eighty percent, dude?”

Blake might have crushed him a bit with hugging back so hard.

Reluctantly, he let go after a few seconds. Adam pulled back as well, though he remained angled towards Blake, legs drawn up on the sofa.

He was looking at him curiously – it made Blake want to squirm, which, he didn’t do that, usually.

“So. You’re realizing that now?”

Adam did not say ‘after two failed marriages’, but whether he thought it or not, that was what Blake heard in the question. And Blake wasn’t exactly proud of what he had to say for himself.

But he didn’t look away.

“I might have decided early on that I didn’t want to be gay.”

Wow. Adam looked pretty… offended by that. And why wouldn’t he be. _His brother’s gay, dumbass, you know that._

“It… I was just a kid.”

He didn’t like how defensive that sounded, though Adam’s expression softened immediately and that made it easier to go on.

“Nobody told me not to be, or anything, either. Nobody in my family said anything bad. There was just… they seemed to think it some kind of hardship? Something to feel sorry about.”

Now Adam looked angry again. And somewhat… shifty? Guilty? What was that about?

The only thing he said, however, and it came off sounding disappointed, in Blake or himself, Blake didn’t really know, was,

“And nothing since that point, when you were, what,…?”

“Nine.”

“Nine? Really. Nothing since you were nine years of age made you change that opinion?”

Blake shook his head silently, feeling ashamed. And defensive, again.

“It just kept being easier that way. Or so I thought. I mean, don’t you think there’s a difference between ‘It’s okay to be gay’ and ‘It is damn fine to be gay’?”

“Yeah,” Adam said quietly, “there definitely is.”

He emptied his bottle in big gulps.

“Woah there, slow down,” Blake murmured. Couldn’t help himself. Adam heard the echo of yesterday in his voice.

“That… were you thinking about all of _that_ yesterday?”

Blake only nodded. He was running out of words, apparently. Though Adam wasn’t running out of questions.

“What made you change your mind, then?”

_I fell in love. Holy crap, did I fall in love._

He could never say that to Adam though. Adam, who was being a good friend, and exceptional friend, already backtracking on his question.

“Don’t feel obliged to answer that, sorry. You don’t have to tell me that.”

It was more than slightly ironic, Blake thought, that he’d told Adam ‘I love you’ so many times in front of an audience, and couldn’t in the way that really counted.

Adam continued,

“You most certainly don’t have to tell _me_.”

That gave Blake pause.

“Adam, something you want to tell me instead?”

Adam actually looked relieved for being called out. Like he had something to say, and had an excuse to do it now that Blake had asked.

“Yeah, while we’re at it, I guess. The way you put it… I’m, hm, about thirty percent gay, I’d say? How do you measure that?”

Blake stared at him, not quite able to process what he’d just heard, and answered on autopilot.

“By how much more often you notice guys than girls?”

Adam raised both eyebrows.

“Oh? Well then, thirty or forty maybe.”

He grinned, then shook his head.

“But eighty percent, Blake? Man, you’re an idiot.”

Blake finished off his own beer before replying.

“Yes, well, you’ve always maintained that, haven’t you?”

He was completely unprepared for Adam hugging him again. Unprepared for hair tickling his stubble, for a kiss pressed to his – mercifully clothed – chest. Every touch felt magnified anyway, and Blake understood with a start that that was because he allowed for them to mean something to him.

And not only that. Adam, his best friend Adam, the one he was stupidly in love with, yes, that Adam, had just gone from completely and utterly unattainable to, well – at least theoretically – attainable. Had been, all along, if Blake had known, or been smart enough to even admit to himself that he wanted to know.

But if nothing had happened yet, considering all the times, all the _years_ they’d been around each other, celebrating together, drunk together, happy and sad together – if nothing had happened yet, it stood to reason that Adam was just not interested.

He’d been wrong yesterday.

It was now, right this moment, that he knew he was truly and utterly fucked.

 

~---~

 

“You ever told anybody?”

Blake asked, eyes fixed on the toaster.

They were preparing breakfast in peace, because, by some miracle, they had both woken before the kids. Or maybe it wasn’t so surprising, after all. They’d gone to bed (or, in Blake’s case, the couch) pretty early, and Blake at least usually woke early too, when something was on his mind.

He didn’t have to specify his question, Adam had understood.

“I talked with Michael. A long time ago. I couldn’t lie to him, when he was ‘being brave’ himself.”

The air quotes expressed faint disgust. For the people who said that kind of thing, chose to characterize it like that, not for the people who did it, Blake realized, even before Adam said,

“You’re right, as long as, in the eyes of the world, people need to be brave for coming out, there’s definitely a difference.”

Blake knew he was staring at Adam again. But what was he to do. It was better than giving in to the urge to trace those tattoos with his fingers. And Adam didn’t notice, he had more to say.

“He thought I could have said something in that ‘It gets better’-vid I did. But he wasn’t, I mean, he wasn’t angry or anything that I didn’t. Kind of depressing, that he accepted why I wouldn’t want to do it as long as there was no…”

Now Adam looked up, trailing off for a second, and meeting Blake’s stare with a slight smile that found its way straight into Blake’s chest, and sent warmth spreading through him.

“He made me promise, though,” and the smile stayed on Adam’s lips as he picked up his thought again, “that I wouldn’t hide it if I ever got into a serious relationship with a man.”

He looked happy about it, like he’d had made his peace with the idea long ago. Then, his eyes focused on Blake, and why, oh why, was he looking at him like that?

The noise of naked feet padding on tiles broke the moment.

“Mum?”

A little boy’s voice drifted into the kitchen from the hallway.

“Mum? Oh, uncle Adam.”

Luke sounded half-awake and not all that happy to be here. And then he spotted Blake.

“You’re still here!”

To his credit, Adam looked only a little bit annoyed when Luke clung to Blake just a second later, ignoring his uncle completely.

“You’re still wearing the same shirt.”

That was Alissia.

“Good morning, Alissia,” Adam said pointedly, and was ignored yet again.

“Did you sleep in that shirt?”

She wasn’t deterred in the slightest. Blake grumbled,

“Yes, you little menace.”

He looked helplessly at the tomato-stained shirt he was wearing over his boxer shorts. A shower would be nice, but he didn’t have anything  fresh for afterwards. The thought of putting on yesterday’s trousers and socks to get a taxi ‘home’ didn’t really appeal, either.

“I probably should go,” he nevertheless tried half-heartedly.

“No!” Luke and Adam chorused.

“Breakfast first.”

So, yes, breakfast first, but that didn’t solve the problem of yesterday’s clothes.

“Adam,” Blake said quietly, when he was pretty sure the kids weren’t listening.

“I really should be gone when your sister comes to pick ‘em up. I mean, how does that look…”

Adam frowned.

“Like you spent the night here,” he said, matter-of-factly. “She’s not going to tell the press or anything, if that’s what you’re worried about.”

Blake shook his head. Adam sounded just so… unfazed that he let the matter drop.

 

Once again, the kids turned out to be a marvelous distraction. They spent the morning by the pool, and so it was that Blake’s whole inner monologue about clothes turned out to have been a complete waste of time, because he greeted Julia in a pair of Bermuda shorts and not much else.

Adam had thrown them at his head earlier.

“There. You forgot those last year.”

And so he had.

He suddenly remembered an afternoon by the pool at Adam’s, on one of those depressing home alone in L.A. weekends. There’d been a text _: Shelton, get your ass over here, I’m having an impromptu pool party._ What had followed was an afternoon of just hangin’ around, quite a bit of drinking, and laughter, so much laughter. Adam had put a guitar in his hands when everyone else had left, and they’d sat there in the patio, on the steps by the pool, a bit drunk, playing just about every song that came to mind.

Blake stared at the pair of black Bermuda shorts with neon orange floral print – Miranda had bought those shortly before it had all gone to hell, and he’d forgotten them on purpose, hoping Adam would throw them away. But they were part of a happy memory now.

When he looked up, Adam was gone. Dimly, he recalled hearing,

“You know where the bathroom is, I have to go after the kids right now. Luke can’t swim.”

So he made haste to join them after a quick shower.

He found both kids wearing swimmies and floating on an overly large inflatable piece of pizza, and Adam (without swimmies) floating on an equally ridiculous pink plastic doughnut, sunglasses on and managing to look cool somehow.

For a wild second, Blake imagined those were his kids, and his… husband. He’d always wanted kids, but for that to work, no relationship, not even his marriages, had ever felt stable enough (and that should have been a warning sign right there). As for having a husband…

With a loud splash, Blake jumped into the pool, sprinkling everyone with water and making Adam squeak louder than the kids.

They were still by the pool when Julia showed up before noon, though Adam had very responsibly made sure to move the kids onto a folding chair in the shade a while ago.

Adam had gone to answer the door, and Blake was trying to calm a heated argument about whether they should be playing “monkey in the middle” (Luke was all for it, while Alissia, very sensibly, argued that there was not much use playing that particular game with someone as big as Blake).

“Hi there,” Julia said with a grin, and, as much as both kids seemed to have enjoyed their stay, they clung to her in seconds. Shouts of “Daddy” followed, as her husband (Gregory, was it?) stepped out of the house as well. Blake decided that he would not be embarrassed and that he would definitely not interpret the look that was exchanged between husband and wife after he’d greeted them. Adam had miraculously found him a shirt and flip-flops earlier – both quite big, though still too small for Blake, but as long as he left the shirt open, it didn’t look too bad, and he felt at least somewhat clothed in front of people he had maybe met twice before.

He was relieved to hear that they would not be staying for lunch.

Now that the children were told to put their clothes on and pack their bags, however, Luke clung to Blake.

“He really likes you,” Gregory said in that almost-accusing tone parents sometimes adopted in this kind of situation.

Blake shrugged and picked the boy up so he could sit on his shoulders again.

“I’m tall, that’s all there is to that.”

“Hey, you’re also funny,” Alissia piped up, and Luke basically screamed into his ear,

“And he sang that song for the movie we watched, mum!”

“I thought you were asleep for that,” Blake murmured, and didn’t look at the slightly bemused parents. Instead, his gaze fell on Adam, who had come up behind them, and was watching the scene unfold with a hand over his heart.

The gesture was probably meant to be mocking, but there was something in his eyes and smile that belied the intention. _Fondness_ , Blake thought, and gave a quick smile in return.

Finally, Luke consented to go packing as long as he would be carried by Blake, and Alissia tagged along.

Half an hour later, they were alone again.

“Well. I guess I really should – “

“Blake.”

Adam interrupted his reluctant offer to leave, voice very serious.

“Yes?”

“Have you had a freak-out yet about… about what you told me?”

Sometimes, that guy really managed to shock him. It was certainly a pertinent question. Though he suspected his freak-out might be more about being in love with Adam than anything else. That had set the whole thought process in motion, after all. But Adam didn’t know that, of course.

“Er, no? Not really?” Blake offered honestly. If he didn’t count his sleepless night; but that had been more taking stock than panicking.

“Do you think you will as soon as you have a bit of time on your hands?”

“Possibly.”

_Very probably, just not for the reason you think._

“Then stay.”

_That won’t work, though, if you’re here to distract me…_

He hadn’t even protested, before Adam held up both hands.

“I’ll stay out of your hair, all right? I just… don’t you think it’s better to have someone near in that kind of situation?”

A pleading tone had crept into his voice, and he couldn’t mean… _what kind of situation?_

“Adam. I’m not going to do something stupid.”

But Blake was already acquiescing, really.

_You might do something stupid, you know. And if it only is drinking way too much. It will be easier to hold back, knowing you would embarrass yourself in front of Adam…_

“Well, maybe I’m projecting,” Adam murmured in the meantime, and the implication of Adam freaking out about something and doing ‘something stupid’ – and didn’t everyone know what that euphemism meant in the end – was a punch to the gut.

_No, god, don’t, don’t you dare, call me if you ever, please. Promise me._

And he’d said at least part of that aloud in a hasty tangle of words. And might have sounded as desperate as he felt.

Adam stared. Then shrugged.

“See?”

“Adam…”

“Yes, yes, done. I promise. You’ll stay?”

Blake nodded.

“I need some clothes,” he said dumbly, and Adam laughed.

 

~---~

 

Adam was driving him to distraction, and Blake was beginning to wonder whether he was doing it on purpose. He’d put a shirt on briefly when they went to pick up some clothes at Blake’s place, but as soon as they were back behind the gate and out of the car, the shirt went flying somewhere.

Now, he did keep his promise of giving Blake space, vanishing first for the yoga practice he’d foregone in the morning, then somewhere with his guitar, came in briefly looking for his laptop, and later he took a book from the living room – but every time he passed through, he was shirtless.

_He’s always done that, though. It’s just that you’re lookin’ now._

Or maybe he was trying to hurry Blake’s freak-out along.

Only, that didn’t seem to be forthcoming. Would have been too easy, really, to schedule it for a calm Sunday afternoon. More likely the whole situation would catch up with him during the next Voice taping – or make that a live show, even better. Or maybe, just maybe there wasn’t anything to freak out about, really.

What was changing, after all? He was only stopping to pretend. He could stop looking pointedly away from all the guys, and that was nice, wasn’t it. Well. And he was hopelessly in love with his best friend, which sucked, because he still had no clue what to do about that.

At some point in the early evening, Adam came back in (he’d found a shirt somewhere, thank god), held some healthy-looking food under his nose and planted himself on the couch next to Blake.

“You still good?”

“Yeah.”

They ate in silence, until Adam put his plate down and ventured,

“So, there are a handful of openly gay country artists out there, I take it?”

Blake nearly spat out the rest of his salad.

“Holy fuck.”

Adam looked startled, and a bit apologetic.

_Alright, deep breath now._

“That was a good try, you know. I was successfully avoiding thinking about that.”

Yes, there were a handful, but really no more than that. And they’d really only started coming out publicly in the last five years or so.

Right, so maybe there were a few stupid, disgustingly _commercial_ reasons he’d clung to his childhood decision for so long. And maybe that wasn’t a maybe.

He’d thought he’d left the levels of self-hatred he was reaching right now behind during his teenage years. Then again, he’d never really seen himself as a grown-up, so it stood to reason that that had a few negative side effects.

Calmly, carefully, Blake put his plate down and hid his face in his large hands.

“Think you could punch me?” he said a bit hoarsely. The question drew a confused sound from Adam, who, of course, wasn’t following his internal monologue.

 _Don’t you understand?_ Blake wanted to scream. _I lied to myself. For thirty-two fuckin’ years I lied to myself. That’s disgusting, it really is._

He didn’t voice any of it. Instead, Adam replied; quietly, his tone still so confused that it hurt Blake to hear it.

“I see no reason to punch you.”

_You wouldn’t, would you._

Blake stood, suddenly bursting with angry energy. He needed to get rid of it right now. His hands formed tight fists. And even though, in a muted corner of his mind, he knew what a terrible idea it was to drive a fist into a wall, he took a few quick steps and raised his hand, took a swing…

From behind, strong arms wrapped around his torso in an iron grip, keeping him from moving.

“Stop! Stop.”

Adam’s voice. Clear, but slightly panicked.

Why was he doing that, Blake needed to… he needed to… he…

His thoughts ground to a halt.

The only thing that was real was Adam’s warm body pressing into his back, and Adam’s voice. His voice, whispering.

“Hey, no, you don’t want to do that, all right? And I don’t want you to do that either. Blake, calm down…”

There was more, but Blake didn’t really process it anymore. What mattered was that Adam was holding onto him, even if Blake was a horrible, horrible person.

He might have said that, might have told Adam not to bother with him, might have tried to approximate with words what was going through his head – if so, he didn’t remember afterwards.

The only thing that stuck in his mind was this: suddenly, Adam was in front of him, gripping one of Blake’s hands in both of his, pulling him along to that room he’d disappeared into in the afternoon for a while, the room Blake privately called the ‘guitar room’, even if there were other instruments there.

But mainly guitars. A whole lotta guitars.

Adam picked one for himself and pushed one into Blake’s hand and Blake stared at it, not entirely sure he knew what to do with a guitar right at that moment.

“Sit down.”

So Blake sat.

And Adam played – a bit aimlessly at first, a few bars of a Johnny Cash song – _really, Adam?_ –, some kind of solo Blake supposed he knew from somewhere, then something nice and easy that would usually have had Blake joining in.

He looked down at his left hand on the board – his fingers were shaking.

But listening to Adam play, that he could do.

And at some indefinite point later, he did join in, strummed along just a little.

A smile broke out on Adam’s face, and for once it didn’t rile Blake up how satisfied with himself the man could look.

Then, Adam looked straight at him, and put a hand over the strings of his guitar, letting silence fall, before he shrugged, and said, as if they’d been in the middle of conversation,

“If we were not in Paparazzi City here, I’d suggest a walk next.”

Oh, what Blake wouldn’t give to be –

“You’re missing Oklahoma right now.”

_Wait, what?_

“You a mind-reader now, Adam?”

His voice had gone hoarse once more.

“No. You get that look, though, when you think about home.”

“What look? I don’t get a look…”

Just like that, they were off bickering again, and that bit of normalcy was an incredible relief.

 

~---~

 

Later, much later, when the light-smogged darkness of L.A. had long since fallen, they sat out by the pool again, letting their feet hang into the water.

“You realize I could have easily smashed that guitar. I was out of it.”

Adam looked at him sideways, the smile becoming irritating again.

“Oh, I was sure you wouldn’t.”

Blake tilted his head to look back at Adam without turning towards him.

“Why?”

An honest to god…giggle.

“Come on, you’ve always been a gentle giant.”

Blake just shook his head, didn’t even consider reacting to the taunt.

“I was really angry at myself.”

 “That much I understood. Don’t think you should be, though.”

Again with the irritating smile. It pulled at something inside Blake, that smile. Maybe not so irritating after all, more like – _stop it, you can continue pining for Adam later, you idiot. You had something to say here._

“I lied to myself.”

“And you believed the lie.”

Adam sounded almost like that excused it somehow.

Blake pulled his knees up and rested his head on them. He was too tall to sit like this. He couldn’t make himself small, even when he wanted to.

“Don’t you agree that makes it worse?”

There. That didn’t sound hoarse anymore. Now it sounded hollow, and that was about right. So he went on, without looking up.

“That gives me such a convenient out, you see? Oops; didn’t know myself. But do you understand what that means? I built it all on a lie, I… It’s all… I’m a… a sham. _A disappointment_. Everyone would think that. Everyone will.”

Beside him, Adam took a deep breath. A hand shook his shoulder violently, making Blake’s chin bump on his knees and his teeth clash.

And then, Adam whispered, low and intense, but getting louder by the second, until he was almost screaming,

“I don’t care, Blake. I don’t care, do you hear me? Or rather, I’m happy you figured it out, okay? But this does not define you. You… you temporarily misplaced a part of yourself. An important part, but still. That happens. That’s human. Now don’t – “

Blake had never heard Adam like this. His hand was clawing into Blake’s shoulder, and Blake only meant to shrug it off, really he did, but when Adam held on, he felt a second of panic. Adam was strong, and it _hurt_.

So Blake jumped up, or tried to, twisting out of Adams grip, bumping into him, losing his balance, flailing, outstretched hands falling forward, pushing Adam. Into the pool, shirt and all.

“Shit. Sorry.”

Adam was only just resurfacing, so Blake repeated himself.

Adam, however, shook himself like a dog, sending drops flying that glinted in the dim light, and chuckled.

“You clumsy oaf. Give me a hand.”

And Blake did. Unquestioningly.

Which was why, only a second later, he was spluttering and cursing, his clothes soaking through even as he was still finding his feet again in the pool.

The water wasn’t more than waist-high (well, for him, anyway), and when he looked up, there Adam was, looking ridiculous, hair all plastered to his forehead, but also ridiculously pleased with himself.

He seemed to expect a counter-attack. When Blake did nothing, he shrugged, and began to fumble with the buttons of his clinging wet shirt.

It was mesmerizing.

Blake’s eyes followed the fingers that struggled with soaked fabric, revealed more and more of the tattooed skin. Until, halfway through, they stopped.

With a sudden feeling of dread, Blake looked up, and right into Adam’s wide eyes.

He’d seen him look. And had put two and two together.

“Me?”

If Adam hadn’t sounded so astonished, Blake might have been freaking out. Instead he felt angry, as if Adam was to blame for not knowing, not getting it.

“Yes, of course ‘you’. What kind of a question is that? I mean, who else?”

He’d meant to spit the words, but they came out quiet and raspy instead.

Then, Adam was taking a step backwards, two steps backwards, and that was the wrong direction, and oh god, what had he done. What had he done.

But Blake’s mortification didn’t last long, when he heard,

“You don’t… you can’t…”

He succeeded in making him even angrier, Adam did. This time, Blake’s reply really was loud and furious.

“I can and I do. Deal with it.”

And he definitely had to get out of here before he said anything more. How the hell had this happened?

Two quick steps and Blake was by the side of the pool, pushing himself out of the water. Instantly, his clothes became a heavy weight, pulling at him.

“Hey, asshole, I was not saying no!”

Blake whipped around, looking down at Adam, still standing in the water where Blake had left him, and looking really not ridiculous at all, more like he was in a goddamn music video or something, his hands held out in supplication. With a shrug and a wry smile on his face, Adam said, sounding perfectly calm about it now,

“You just shocked me.”

For the second time in a matter of minutes, Blake found himself in a pool fully clothed, though this time he jumped of his own volition. More or less. Adam seemed to have some kind of magnetic quality to him.

Blake half expected, and dreaded more than anything, that Adam would move away from him again, but he didn’t.

He just kept standing there, with a tiny smile only just tilting up the corners of his mouth, and a glint in his eyes that let them shine bright in the darkness.

He just kept standing there, even as Blake framed Adam’s face in his hands. As Blake moved his thumbs under Adam’s chin, tilting it up.

As Blake leaned down and kissed him.

It was a careful brush of lips at first, but then Adam’s stubble caught in the bit of a beard Blake usually sported, and Blake instantly pressed down harder.

It rasped and stung, a counterpoint to the relative softness of lips.

But even then, Adam didn’t back away.

Instead, he pulled Blake’s lower lip between his teeth, and very carefully did not bite down on it, released it again after a few seconds, traced it with his tongue, while Blake shuddered, some kind of electric charge running over his skin.

With a little hum in the back of his throat, Adam’s tongue licked into one corner of Blake’s lips, which he then kissed, pulling back just the slightest bit, only to suddenly let his head fall forward, his lips latching onto Blake’s neck, right below the earlobe. The fast movement of stubble over stubble as their cheeks brushed burned, not necessarily unpleasantly, but strong enough to draw a surprised “Ouch” from Blake.

This prompted a chuckle, Adam’s face buried into Blake’s neck, the sound muffled, made palpable. It set off another one of those electric charges. Not to be mistaken for a shiver, which followed afterwards, a gust of wind serving as a reminder of cold clothes clinging unpleasantly to their bodies.

Adam snuggled closer, because of course he did, and as thrilling as that should have been, the night was getting rather chilly. Blake grumbled,

“You’re cold.”

“Well, get us out of my pool and inside my house, would you?” Adam said quietly, and as loath to move as Blake was, that was probably a good idea.

“Come on then. I’m not carrying you.”

“No?”

The grin in Adam’s voice made his lips move against Blake’s skin.

“No.”

He didn’t even manage to sound annoyed. Adam didn’t move, though, only replied, lips still brushing Blake’s neck,

“You’ll have to let me go then.”

 _Oh_.

Somehow, Blake seemed to now have his arms around him, even if he didn’t know how they’d gotten there. He loosened his grip on Adam’s shoulders, and they moved apart.

Blake didn’t know where to look, whether to look up, felt clumsy.

He saw movement out of the corner of his eye, and a second later, Adam’s hands framed his face, just briefly, the time it took to lean in and place a kiss on Blake’s forehead.

The gentle touch was so surprising that Blake forgot to move. After a few seconds, he quickly followed Adam, who had already pushed himself out of the pool.

He stared at Adam’s ass in his wet shorts on the way into the house. Who wouldn’t, honestly. ( _Well, the stupid you of three days ago would have forced himself to look away_ ).

As soon as they were through the glass doors, Adam stopped, dripping water onto the floor.

“So.” he stated, and the sudden nervousness in his voice was comforting and endearing in equal measure. Instead of making him worry about potential second thoughts, it served to make Blake feel more at ease. This was Adam. Nervous, jittery, heart-stoppingly beautiful Adam. But still only Adam. Blake smiled at him.

“So we should get out of these clothes.”

They were already leaving puddles, after all.

“Oh yes.”

My oh my. Not what he’d meant.

Adam’s tone had changed in a heartbeat, as deep and husky as his voice could possibly go. And confident again, the cocky bastard. Blake’s comment truly had been innocent, but Adam was thinking about something else entirely, it was right there in his voice.

Like a deer in the headlights, that’s how Blake felt right then when Adam met his eyes, and clearly it showed.

“Scared, cowboy?”

And he was taunting him. Again, this was something that was comfortingly familiar.

Blake felt his lips move into a familiar smirk.

“Of you? Never.”

Adam shrugged, and began to disrobe.

Blake couldn’t look away.

When Adam’s beautiful body was completely bared, the muscles taut with what might have been nervousness, Blake finally remembered that his clothes had to go as well, and hastened to follow suit. It was a good way to keep himself from staring at Adam’s cock.

He felt like he always felt in this type of situation, when baring himself in front of someone – too big to be at ease in his own body. Too tall; either not lithe enough, or not muscled enough. Awkward.

Mercifully, there were no lights on in the room. However, enough moonlight made its way through the glass door and windows that he could see Adam perfectly well, so the reverse also had to be true. And he felt Adam’s eyes on him.

Unclothed, Blake straightened defiantly, daring Adam to say anything.

With the movement he looked up at last, into eyes that were dark and round and definitely riveted on him.

“What?” Blake murmured, when Adam continued to stare. Adam didn’t reply. Almost trance-like, he moved forward, reached out, brushed his hands over Blake’s shoulders, upper arms, forearms, laid them on Blake’s waist next, moved on to the small of his back and… lower. Pulled them closer together with a firm grip.

Blake’s eyes snapped down, just in time to see his own half-hard cock brush against Adam’s muscled belly.

He let out a noisy breath, and Adam tilted his head upwards, a little smile on his lips and his eyes focused again.

“Wasn’t sure I’d like you being so tall,” he said in a low voice, and continued seriously, as if imparting a great confidence,

“I fuckin’ love it, though.”

There they stood, skin touching skin, and Blake was paralyzed, felt a hundred things at the same time, all of them too much and not enough.

He saw the look on Adam’s face slowly change to a worried frown. Shaking his inertia, Blake kissed him full on the mouth, brought his arms around him, pushed them closer together still.

_This. This right here._

Exhilarating, electrifying, fuckin’ terrifying.

Adam groaned into the kiss, his erection pressing against Blake’s thigh. Well, that was unfamiliar.

He didn’t realize he’d stopped to respond to the kiss until Adam peered up at Blake again with that stupid worry on his face and took half a step back, just enough to break the skin contact. Blake instantly felt cold. Bereft.

“Are you sure?”

Adam looked like the words had been forced out of him, like he really really did not want to interrupt, but had to at the same time. Before Blake could stop him, he already went on,

“Because, you know, you only just realized, you said, and I… if you hated me for this tomorrow, I couldn’t bear it.”

He sounded so very earnest, and Blake didn’t understand how Adam, his Adam, could think such things.

“Adam, I love you.”

And he’d meant to say it like he’d said it a hundred times already, just to reassure Adam that he would never intentionally hurt him, but it came out differently.

There was a weight behind the words that had probably been there for a very long time, but that had never been allowed to color them before.

Adam’s eyes snapped to his, and he drew in a sharp breath.

“Oh god, you really do.”

He sounded… not scared, no, he sounded…. _awed_ , and that was good, wasn’t it?

“Yeah.”

Blake, for his part, now sounded as bashful as he felt, because who told someone they loved them minutes after the first kiss? He just couldn’t keep his mouth shut, could he? And how awkward was it to have this conversation naked, by the way? He forced himself to keep his eyes firmly on Adam’s face.

Adam’s eyes suddenly narrowed, and that didn’t look good, _Blake, you idiot, what have you done now, he’s gonna change his mind, he’s gonna go ahead and break your heart…_

With careful precision, as if testing out the words on his tongue and finding each of them good, Adam stated,

“I”,

Was that a smile tugging at his lips, _what the hell?_

“love,”

 _Oh_.

“you,”

And now the smile was achingly bright.

“too.”

Blake could do nothing but smile back soppily. Quickly, Adam added, his eyes sparkling with mischief,

“Now can we fuck?”

After a heartbeat of silence, they both dissolved into slightly nervous laughter, and Blake reached out, pulling Adam in, hugging him tightly, letting his hands wander down to that shapely ass. As soon as it had come, the laughter petered off again, to be replaced by rumbling groans and breathless moans, until Adam decreed,

“Bedroom, come on.”

Blake trailed behind again, this time intentionally, to admire the view, and Adam caught him with a look over the shoulder that was immediately followed by an eyeroll, even though he looked quite pleased.

Like a boy, Blake tackled him, landing them both on Adam’s monster of a bed.

Adam didn’t protest, just looked up at Blake again from this new angle.

Finally, Blake acted on his desire to trace those tattoos with hands and lips. He roamed aimlessly for a bit, before moving steadily lower. When he arrived at ‘California’, he was confronted with a bit of unmistakably male anatomy, straining upwards.

He paused for a second, looking his fill, but it caused Adam to murmur, with a weary little sigh,

“You can just kiss me again, you know.”

Blake smiled up at him.

“I think I’ll do that.”

And lent down to press a firm kiss to the tip of Adam’s erect cock.

“Blake!”

Hah, Adam clearly hadn’t been expecting that.

Drawing in a deep breath full of musky scent, Blake licked up the underside, making Adam squirm and shudder, and that was just incredible. Blake wanted to hear that again, wanted to provoke reaction after reaction, draw them out.

“Tell me if I’m doin’ it wrong,” he stated, his breath gusting over sensitive skin, making Adam shudder again and boosting Blake’s confidence.

Blowjobs were messy, unsurprisingly. And weird, but Blake wasn’t complaining, at least not until Adam pulled him up by his hair right in the middle of it.

“Watcha do that for?” he rasped, but Adam only looked at him strangely, somewhat appraisingly, and asked,

“D’you want to fuck me?”

Blake’s mind went blank for a second. And then into overdrive.

“God, I can’t do that, Adam, I don’t have a clue what to do. I mean…”

He felt his face go red and saw Adam hiding a smile.

“You’re pretty good at this blowjob thing, let me tell you.”

Blake smiled down at him and shrugged, as much as that was feasible when holding oneself up on one’s arms.

“I’ve been on the receiving end of those. But not…”

He trailed off again. God, his face felt even more hot now. He hadn’t blushed like that in ages.

Adam had no compunction about completing the thought, though he sounded incredulous.

“’You saying you want to be on the receiving end first?”

 _Oh hell._ Between Blake’s head screaming ‘Are you out of your mind’ and his cock ratcheting his arousal up a notch, Blake of course went with… the latter. With a sigh, he let himself roll to Adam’s side, and addressed the ceiling.

“Yeah.”

He heard a quiet “fuck” from Adam, felt him get up ( _no, wait,_ _where’s he goin’?_ ), heard some kind of clatter from the approximate location of the bedside table ( _most likely_ _getting some lube, idiot_ ).

Then, Adam was leaning over him, looking serious.

“If you’re uncomfortable, we’re stopping.”

And proceeded to take his world apart.

The fingers that touched him – _there, oh, right there_ – were sure; _he’s not doin’ that for the first time_ , the thought reassuring and jealousy-inducing; _oh fuck, is that his mouth?_ ; pushing the first one in, _that feels stran – oh wow, though, what was that?;_ sparks and another one; momentary discomfort but already with the promise of something good; an explosion of feeling and _Adam, Adam, Adam_.

The first thing Blake was aware of, coming down from his high – and had it ever felt quite like that? – was Adam’s chuckle.

“Guess you liked that.”

He sounded a bit strained, and Blake, even though his head felt like it weighed a ton, hastened to look up at the sound, making himself dizzy.

Adam had slumped down beside him, a hand on his cock, quickly stroking, and Blake murmured, “Hey. Let me,” already reaching out.

One hand captured Adam’s, the other wrapped around his length, and Adam practically arched off the bed. Such a lovely sight.

Blake pressed Adam’s hand down onto the bed, their fingers linking.

A few more light strokes, making Adam squirm again – and hadn’t Blake always loved doing that? –, two firm ones, and Adam was spilling all over his hand.

There was nothing for it – Blake stared unabashedly. From the way Adam’s eyes squeezed shut, to the taunt lines of his face that disappeared all at once with the tension easing, to the shaking breath he drew through slightly curled lips, he was utterly fascinating.

Belatedly, he noticed the stickiness on his hand, and wiped it off on the sheets with a faint noise of disgust. Adam, of course, chose that moment to open his eyes. His smile was tentative, shaky even.

Blake kissed him on the nose.

“Eww.”

That was exactly the reaction he’d expected, and it sent a laugh rolling through Blake. Fine lines crinkled around Adam’s eyes as he smiled, and Blake kissed the smile next.

“We’re doing that again,” he said, directly against Adam’s lips.

“Right now? Dude, I’m exhausted.”

Adam put on his best whiny voice, even as his wobbly smile was turning into a satisfied grin. Reacting without even thinking about it, Blake leaned heavily on him, and whispered directly into his ear,

“But I want you inside me.”

He could say that with absolute confidence, after what Adam had just done to him with only his fingers.

“Fuck, man.”

A sudden grip on Blake’s arms, and Adam rolled them around, straddling him. Blake smirked up at him contentedly.

“What happened to ‘exhausted’?”

“That – “

Adam brought their dicks into alignment, and Blake responded with a hearty groan –

“what you said right now, I mean,”

He ground down, drawing another loud moan,

“that would have given a dead man an erection.”

Blake got in one last quip – “Come on, you’re not talking about dead people while in bed with me” – and then gave himself up to sensation again.

Afterwards, that was what he remembered. Sensation.

Sensation, and a few moments that stood out crystal clear in an otherwise blissful haze.

Adam grinning mischievously before putting his mouth on Blake’s balls.

Frantically drawing breath after a sloppy, dirty kiss that neither had wanted to break.

The almost-too-much-fullness when Adam added another finger.

Adam’s head thrown back after Blake had let his hands roam down his spine to squeeze his ass.

Rolling a condom on Adam with shaking hands.

A light kiss on Blake’s tattoo, a cushion placed under his hips, Adam’s face as he pushed in, Adam picking up the pace, Adam swearing beautifully, Adam, Adam, Adam, nothing but Adam.

 

~---~

 

Blake woke up.

He knew immediately where he was and why, not even a second of disorientation. He’d always had the tendency to fall asleep after sex.

There was something wet and cold pressing into his hip, and he discovered a used washcloth that was leaving a damp spot on the bed. _Urgh_.

Right after that came the realization that Adam must have cleaned him up, otherwise he’d be much stickier. Should he be embarrassed about that?

Blake sat up, leaning against the headboard, and the next thing he discovered was Adam. He was standing at the window in just his underwear, looking out into the patio, the muscles of his back tense. He must have heard Blake stirring, but he didn’t turn around.

“You’re a cliché, rockstar.”

“Really?”

Adams voice was quiet.

_Yes, really. Standing there in silhouette, like the stereotypical brooding lover in some romantic movie, looking way too sexy, almost naked but somehow unattainable…And, fuck that._

Blake got up, naked as the day he was born and trying not to care about it (there was a small lamp on in the room, the light playing beautifully over Adam’s skin, but what it was doing to his own body he did not want to know). He crossed the room in long strides – all rooms in Adam’s home were oversized – and dared to wrap his arms around Adam from behind.

“Watcha thinkin’ about?”

Adam leaned back into him, thank god, but he remained tense.

“Coming out.”

_Oh. Right._

That was enough to wake him up fully. Still, Blake had a talent for staying calm even when something stressed him out, so all he did was place a sloppy kiss on Adam’s right shoulder.

The tension bled out of Adam slowly, Blake felt it in his arms and hands. Unseeing, his fingers began to draw patterns over Adam’s chest and belly.

Adam sighed, and Blake resigned himself to having a very serious conversation, but what came out of Adam’s mouth was,

“Fuck. Your hands, man.”

_Huh?_

“My hands?” Blake asked, thoroughly confused, but not stopping the movement of his fingers.

Adam gave an annoyed groan, and a breathless laugh.

“They’re sexy, you idiot.”

“They are?”

Turning in his arms, Adam captured one of said hands, and placed a kiss on the knuckles.

“Yes, Mr-Sexiest-Man-Alive.”

 _You thought that one as much of a joke as I did_ , Blake wanted to protest, but let it be when he saw the look in Adam’s eyes.

Who was he to cure the delusions of a rockstar.

He watched with a bit of surprise as a tickling kiss was placed on his chest.

“You successfully distracted me,” Adam murmured, without looking up.

“Do we really have to worry ‘bout all of that right now?”

Now Adam looked up, and though his tone was light when he replied “Hey, I’m a worrier, okay?” there was something like disappointment in his eyes, like he was waiting for Blake to deflect, and then chicken out in the end.

Who the hell did he take him for?

_Alright then._

“You’re telling Michael right away, of course. And you should give us at least a few weeks to ourselves. And to… brace for whatever the world sees fit to throw at us.”

Blake hadn’t thought this through at all, but that sounded reasonable, didn’t it?

Adam’s wide eyes confirmed that, yes, he’d expected a major freak-out. Or was Blake reading it all wrong and Adam was the one freaking out? God, please don’t let it be that. No. It couldn’t be that.

So, a bit of reassurance was in order then.

“Adam. I’m not going to spook like a horse.”

As he’d hoped, his choice of words drew a smile from Adam, who nevertheless squinted up at Blake with a bit of doubt lingering in his eyes.

“How are you so calm about this?”

Blake shrugged.

“Feels right, doesn’t it?”

This time, Adam’s smile was blinding.

“Yes. Yes, it does.”

~---~

Lazing a Monday away, knowing it was back to work for most people, was one of the best feelings in the world. Doing so with someone else, even better. Doing so with your newly acquired _boyfriend?, lover?,_ hell, your _man_ , that was something else.

Blake was doodling away on a notepad. He had a chorus written for a song there, one that might possibly turn into something, but he wasn’t adding any lines to it at the moment. It didn’t frustrate him today. _If it will, it will, and if it won’t, there are enough good songwriters out there to find something for the next album._

From the kitchen, he heard Adam sing,

“Laaaaazy Monday afternoon…”

It captured his mood to perfection.

Because he fucking could, Blake got up, went into the kitchen and kissed Adam on the neck, right on that spot that, on the show, made him crunch up his face and squirm. Adam didn’t do that this time. He made a little noise in the back of his throat that Blake wanted to hear again and again.

“You actually like it when I do that?”

Adam snorted.

“Yes, dumbass, I like that way too much.”

“But you never…”

Adam lifted his eyes ceiling-wards.

“Of course I never let on. God, imagine that. Me stomping all over your denial. That would have gone so well for me. And don’t look at me like that, you can’t tell me that I’m wrong about that.”

Blake sighed.

“Did you have to remind me of my own stupidity just now?”

“You always need to be reminded of your own stupidity.”

Blake let the remark go unanswered. This whole thing was bugging him.

“I thought I was only annoyin’ the hell out of you. I mean, you should have told me to stop…”

He trailed off when the look on Adam’s face registered.

A bit guilty, almost shy.

“Maybe I was taking what I could get. I can be needy like that.”

That wasn’t what he’d expected to hear, and it didn’t sit well with him either. Adam shouldn’t be talking about himself like that.

“If you’re needy, what’d you call me? I was the instigator, for the most part,” Blake grumbled, thoroughly annoyed with himself for being so slow on the uptake, or rather so stubborn in accepting what he’d known, known for a long time now, that was becoming increasingly clear to him. After all, when he’d finally acknowledged it, he had barely lasted two days before Adam had noticed. Which wasn’t all that surprising, because apparently Adam had been waiting for it – but for how long, that was the question Blake was asking himself now.

The thought of Adam quite possibly pining for him shouldn’t make him giddy, he chided himself. It was such a heady feeling, though, to know one was wanted. Then Blake remembered Adam’s moments over the last day of what had certainly seemed like incredulousness at being wanted back, and had no trouble hating himself again.

“What’s going through that head of yours?” Adam murmured right then, a hand on Blake’s arm, and, oh god, there it was again, that bit of insecurity, as if he still expected Blake to change his mind at any second.

Automatically, Blake reached out, drawing the little bundle of nerves in front of him into a tight hug.

“You’re way too good for me,” he whispered into Adam’s hair.

“Don’t be ridiculous.”

But Adam was pressing himself tighter to him, Blake noted happily.

“I’m perfectly serious.”

The protesting noise that emanated from Adam was… sweet. God, Blake was gone for this man.

“And I’m a piece of work.”

“Something to keep me occupied, then.”

“Blake.”

Adam might have been trying for exasperated, but really, it came out fond again.

 

~---~

 

“Blake? You have to see that.”

It was Monday evening, and Blake had succeeded in his goal of doing precisely nothing that day. Though he’d kissed Adam a lot, and that wasn’t nothing, now was it.

Adam was holding out his phone. Blake adjusted the angle of the screen, so he could actually see something, and understood what had Adam on the verge of bursting into laughter.

The photo of the felt pen drawing was a bit blurry, but the giant person with spindly legs, bigger than the tree they were standing next to, wore a red and white shirt and, crucially, had ‘Blake’ written on the chest in differently-colored, shaky letters. What had Adam in stitches, though, was that the Blake in the picture wore a cowboy hat.

“They’ve never even seen you with a hat! The fact that they deemed that necessary to represent you…”

Blake tried to glare, but had a feeling it didn’t work. He was way too pleased.

“Oh come off it, they might have seen a picture of me with a hat.”

Or maybe it was the character from the movie that had made them add it, but he wasn’t about to compare himself to a nasty cartoon pig if Adam didn’t make the connection himself.

“Julia sent that?” he asked unnecessarily.

“Yeah, what do you want me to answer back?”

Blake grinned.

“Ask them if you are in that picture, too. You might be so tiny next to me that you are invisible to the naked eye.”

“Haha. Funny. I’ll tell them you loved it.”

Blake nodded solemnly.

“I do.”

Adam typed his reply, but didn’t even have time to put his phone down before an answer came in, and his eyes went wide.

“Shit.”

“What?”

Silently, Adam held out the phone again.

 <Ohmigod. He’s still with you? Something you’d like to tell me, brother dear? ;-)>

 _Right_. Instead of asking what he really wanted to know (what Adam would like to reply), Blake defaulted to,

“Does she know you’re… bi?”

Adam shrugged.

“I never told her. But I think she might. In that way that women sometimes just know things, if you get what I’m saying.”

Blake did get it. Oh, and while they were discussing that.

“Your parents?”

Adam shrugged again.

“Might suspect something. Had a crush on a boy in high school, though nothing came of it. Well, on second thought, Dad might not have a clue, actually. Your mum?”

His mum. Blake wasn’t looking forward to that conversation.

“I’m flying back home after the blinds.”

 _Fuck_. That was in six days.

Adam was looking at him curiously, his head tilted. Blake hadn’t really answered his question, but Adam had clearly gotten the ‘I’ll have to tell her then’ that had been implied.

“Want me to come with?”

He sounded sincere enough. Blake could do nothing but stare at him. For once, he was utterly lost for words. And so it was that he watched Adam backtrack for a few seconds before he even thought about reacting.

“I mean, that would be weird, of course. And this is… this is really new, so doubly weird. Forget I said that. God, just forget it. Please?”

Adam’s voice cracked a bit on that last word, and it was this more than anything that released Blake from his torpor.

“I’d like you to come,” he said, smiling slightly as the frantic look in Adam’s eyes turned to shock.

“That is to say, not when I… To the ranch. I’d like you to come to Tish.”

Talking to his mum would be awkward enough without Adam present. And who knew how she would react. The thought of coming home to Adam afterwards, however… that held a definite appeal.

Adam didn’t reply, left him hanging, looked down instead to type something on his phone, presumably a reply to Julia, and Blake was getting really nervous, what was he saying to her? God, could he just please look back up at him?

“Adam?”

He astonished himself with how tentative his voice sounded. Plaintive, almost, the way it might twang on a sad song.

Adam’s head shot up, his eyes wild.

“What is it?”

No annoyance in his tone, an honest question. But how could that be? He had to know Blake was waiting for an answer. If he’d changed his mind he wouldn’t sound like that, would he?

Blake didn’t know what to do. Should he ask again? Well, technically he hadn’t asked, but he’d been very clear that he wanted Adam with him, hadn’t he?

What came out of his mouth in the end was,

“Say something.”

Adam frowned.

“What…? Oh. Sorry if I’m ignoring you. I just cancelled the meeting I had for next week, I mean, before I buy a plane ticket I thought I’d do that first?”

And then, as the silence stretched,

“Hey, why are you looking at me like that, cowboy? What’s wrong?”

Blake shook his head.

“Nothin’. Nothin’ at all.”

His hands came up to frame Adam’s face, thumbs stroking over cheekbones, and he kissed him.

 

~---~

 

The blinds flew by in a strange blur.

They joked, and laughed, and hugged, annoyed the hell out of each other in the best way, mock-fought and kissed to make up – on the cheek, of course. Blake went in for one of his neck-kisses before he remembered what Adam had told him, but Adam scrunched up his face like always, feigning disgust very well, so well it almost worried Blake – until Adam half turned away from the camera, lowered his head, and honest-to-god _winked_. With a smile that held a promise for later. He’d really made sure the camera couldn’t pick it up, but Kelly saw it, and turned her head fast enough to catch Blake’s one second of unfiltered reaction, before he managed to school his face. She started to throw Blake looks right after that. Oh well.

When she came up to him during one of the next breaks, a determined look on her face, he told her quietly,

“Kelly. Not now. Or rather, not yet.”

Kelly clapped a hand over her mouth, her eyes widening, then narrowing. She’d only looked surprised for a fraction of a second, which was a bit frightening, actually. It should be surprising, shouldn’t it?

“Serious?” she asked back, just as quietly, ignoring his entreaty to leave it be for the moment.

Blake didn’t know why he should feel bashful, like an errant schoolboy, and in front of Kelly of all people, but he had to look to the ground for a second, before he could meet her eyes again.

“Very.”

He couldn’t help it, a tiny smile made its way to his lips, one that probably came across as besotted as he felt. Kelly took that in, and Blake saw her throw a glance over to where Adam was… watching them. With a frown on his face. Blake remembered that those two didn’t know each other all that well – surprising, really, considering they’d been on the road together at one point. Somehow, they hadn’t connected like he himself and Kelly had.

Kelly, who’d clearly had it in her mind to ask some question about Adam, was sidetracked by Adam’s stare. Blake had a feeling it might have been along the lines of ‘is he good enough for you’, and was glad that she did not go there. What she said was,

“Man, he looks like he wants to murder me.”

_No, Kelly. He looks worried._

“I think he figured what we’re talking about,” Blake told her instead of voicing the thought. He willed her to just let it lay for now. Surprisingly enough, she did, with a much appreciated promise that she’d ‘keep her mouth shut’, a look that said they were going to talk about this at some point, and a sincere-sounding “Good luck.”

Adam came up to him as soon as she’d moved away, looking so so worried.

“Hey, it’s only Kelly,” Blake murmured, wishing they were having this conversation in their trailers instead of the backstage area, where there were always people moving around, setting up stuff, potentially overhearing conversations.

“So she knows? I didn’t think that… well, I guess I shouldn’t have… but, I mean, how?”

Blake wanted to hug him, but there was no real excuse for it right now. That might not have stopped him in the past, but what innocence he’d thought his touches had held before was gone, and he was afraid it might show, here where it couldn’t be dismissed as acting up for the camera.

“She knows me really well,” he tried to explain. “Quite a bit longer than I know you. We’ve been drunk together a lot, too.”

Adam snorted at that, but still looked skeptical.

Blake did his best to reassure him he needn’t be afraid of Kelly, and Adam nodded his head.

 

Still, on the last day of the blinds – Saturday, it was Saturday, exactly a week since Blake had turned his own world upside down, and, yes, he was feeling pretty good about it – Adam knocked on his trailer door insistently, looking frazzled when Blake opened up.

“What…?”

Adam motioned for him to shut the door, then clung to him something fierce. He didn’t answer Blake’s questions, until Blake began to get really worried, and asked insistently,

“Did something get out, Adam? Adam?”

_Not yet, please. Not yet. I need a little time._

Suddenly, Adam looked very embarrassed.

“No, no, nothing like that. Nothing much, really. I just… your Kelly can be pretty scary, when she puts her mind to it.”

“I’m going to kill her.”

What was she thinking, talking to Adam instead of him? She didn’t know anything about anything, who was to say what she’d assumed – he should have spoken to her.

Adam was taking a step back out of their embrace, shaking his head.

“No, no, it was my own fault, I guess. She kept throwing me looks, and it was annoying the hell out of me.”

“So…?”

Adam grinned, one of his shit-eating grins. Apparently he wasn’t as disconcerted as Blake had first thought, and it relieved and annoyed Blake in equal measure. He’d never in his life felt so much like he was walking an emotional tightrope – so much depended on this. Everything depended on this, if he was being honest, and honest was what he’d vowed to be from now on. Everything depended on this, because Blake had, was currently, and would be changing his life, based on this. And Adam?

Adam was grinning at him.

“So I might have asked her what her problem was.”

“Holy hell. I always knew you were stupid.”

It didn’t come out nearly as angry as he’d wanted it to sound. More grudgingly impressed. Adam clearly didn’t perceive any insult, his eyes laughing as much as his mouth.

“It went as well as could be expected after that.”

He still did not sound like it had gone too badly. The bastard, making him all nervous first.

“You goin’ to tell me what went down?”

Adam leaned in for a quick kiss on the cheek.

“Nope.”

He popped the ‘p’. Yes, he could be obnoxious. And Blake loved him. Not in spite of it, no, he loved him for it, which was a bit worrying.

He shook his head, because he had to, said, “Alright, dickhead,” but quickly added “Come ‘ere,” drawing a somewhat surprised looking Adam into another hug.

They stood in silence for a moment. Blake drew in slow breaths. Cologne and hair gel and Adam.

Then he heard this.

“You know, one thing I’ll say, it wasn’t half as uncomfortable as talking to my Dad yesterday.”

_Oh, so now we’re getting to the heart of the matter._

So Adam _was_ upset, had not been toying with him after all. Right now, Blake regretted that. He didn’t want to know. Especially didn’t want to ask. Knew he had to, now that Adam had said something.

It was a strange thing, talking to someone about something so important when you couldn’t see their face. Adam spoke into Blake’s shirt, voice muffled by fabric, tone dejected. He told him about going over to see his father yesterday evening, after the long day of taping, about finding him a bit cranky, but not wanting to come back, get the courage up again. About realizing his dad, though not angry, hadn’t really had it in him to be happy about what Adam had to say; hadn’t been that thrilled to find out his second son was dating a man now, too.

What a perfectly horrible thing to take away from such a conversation, Blake thought.

“Man, it’s like I’m suddenly a child again when I feel like he disapproves of me. It shouldn’t matter so much,” Adam finished.

“Hey now, of course it does,” Blake whispered, his voice soft, pitched low, and yet with some cracks in it that hurt his ears. “He’s gonna come round. And you said it, he’d had a bad day, yeah?”

Finally, Adam looked up, trying for a smile.

“Thanks for putting up with me.”

That would not do.

“Let me be fucking clear: I’m not ‘putting up with you’. Get that out of your pretty little head, alright? And talk to me, if there’s something to talk about. Please.”

_Take it from someone who’s failed at this rather spectacularly before._

“My pretty little head? Fuck you.”

“That’s what you took away from this right now?”

And they were off again – but Blake didn’t fail to notice that there was something different about Adam. The nervous energy from before was all gone.

He looked… content. Not a frequent sight. But definitely a good look for him.

 

~---~

 

Blake was feeling sick to his stomach, and trying not to let it show too much.

Adam saw right through him.

“Hey, remember what you told me? Talk to me, cowboy.”

_Well, yeah._

_What to say, though._

He looked at Adam a bit helplessly.

“I just… I’m going to drive over there now.”

He felt like he’d absorbed all of Adam’s usual nervous energy. Blake suspected it might look absurd on him.

They’d only been at the ranch for a few hours, and Blake had managed to appear calm for a while, showing Adam a few changes made since the last time he’d been for a visit, going for a walk across the grounds to check if everything was as it should be – but now he couldn’t deny it anymore. He had to drive over to Ada sooner rather than later.

“Call first. You don’t want to repeat my mistake.”

Adam sounded calm about it now – maybe because his mom had reacted a lot better than his dad did. Had in fact called her ex, and ‘wiped the floor with him’ (Adam’s words). His brother Michael, for his part, kept sending Adam texts with increasingly dirty suggestions that Adam promptly showed to Blake, making them laugh and blush in equal measure.

Well, calling first was definitely a sensible idea. Blake pulled out his phone before he could talk himself out of it.

Adam’s eyes were on him, but that didn’t bother Blake right now. It felt reassuring, even.

“Momma? Yeah, this morning. Could I come over? No, nothin’ happened. Well, something, I guess, but nothing bad I don’t think. I just… yeah, right. Good.”

Of course he could come over, she said. And then launched into an explanation of how her day had gone.

“Momma, I’m going to be there in an hour, you can talk to me in person. No. No, I won’t interrupt you then. See ya. Bye.”

Blake hung up and rolled his eyes at Adam, who was laughing at him, but quickly grew serious once more.

“Go. Before you get scared again.”

“Hey!”

It was a half-hearted protest at best.

Lord knows he was scared.

Adam moved in for a kiss that grew intense, beyond intense in just a few seconds. It bordered on aggressive; a clash of lips and teeth. It let Blake’s buzzing thoughts grind to a halt. He was reluctant to let go, but Adam made the decision for him, pulling back sharply.

“Go,” he repeated, sounding breathless.

“You bastard,” Blake rasped, his voice reflecting exactly how turned on he was right then. Adam’s eyes went wide, but he kept his distance.

When Blake stepped out onto the terrace, he felt a hand on his arm, though. Adam’s other hand moved up to the side of Blake’s face, then to his neck, smoothing over unruly curls.

“I’ll be waiting for you.”

The words stayed with him for most of his forty-minute drive, but in the end, nervousness flooded him again, washing them away.

 

Blake saw to it that he got his momma alone as soon as possible.

Then he faltered.

“Didn’t you have so much to tell me earlier?” he asked her. Not at all how he’d wanted to start this conversation.

She looked at him critically. Her eyes were kind, but too knowing. As good as it was to see her, this sort of look was always worrying him a little.

“Oh, that can wait. Somethin’s eating at you.”

And just like that, Blake calmed down. Because, really, nothing was eating at him. Not anymore. It had been, for a long time, before.

He almost smiled. Then, he remembered something.

Quietly, he began,

“Now, about what I’m gonna tell you… You know, you can be angry all you want. All I ask of you is not to feel sorry for me.”

That brought a tender look to her eyes. She hadn’t forgotten, then, how much he’d always hated being pitied.

“I promise,” she said solemnly.

They were in the kitchen, and that wasn’t bad – there was always stuff lying around here, and no place to really sit down, it was familiar and comfortable, but, unfortunately, rather small. It was easy for Blake to just feel physically too big for a room.

“I’m in a new relationship.”

And he hadn’t wanted to start like that either. Because his mom looked instantly happy for him, and then kind of weary for a second, before the smile came back.

“That’s great, honey. I’m happy for you.”

Blake held up a hand. He had to explain this, set this up, he couldn’t just… But his mouth was not obeying him.

“With Adam.”

His mom looked just so honestly _confused_ for a second, that it made Blake ache. He waited for it to change, any moment now… and strangely enough, it did, in a way that felt like a big fucking Déjà-vu, but why…

 _Kelly_. Kelly had looked like that. Somewhat intense, but almost immediately not surprised anymore.

And all his momma said at first was,

“All right.”

Not in a disbelieving way, or like she was trying to take it in. More in a ‘okay, got it’-way. Stupidly, Blake asked,

“You don’t need an explanation?”

Why the hell couldn’t he just keep his mouth shut? His mum waved a hand, as if dismissing the question, though she answered anyway.

“You always tried a little too hard not to look at the boys.”

And that shocked him, it truly did. She’d suspected all along? When he hadn’t, for the most part? That couldn’t be right.

“I didn’t do it on purpose. Not really. I didn’t… I didn’t know.”

His tone had gone defensive again, he just couldn’t help it when it came to this, and suddenly, her eyes were narrowing dangerously.

“I should hope so. I mean. Blake – you weren’t… that is, you were in love with them?”

She looked at him imploringly, but seemed ready for seething anger at the same time. She didn’t have to specify whom she meant with ‘them’, Blake had understood immediately what she was asking.

“Yes,” he replied with a sigh. “I loved Kaynette. I loved Miranda.”

And it was still painful to say that, though as time went by the pain came more and more from how it had ended than from anything else.

“Just… If I hadn’t been so dead set against it, I might have…”

_Might have what? Screwed around with some guys, fallen for some guys, gotten punched by some guys for coming on to them…?_

“… ended up with someone else.”

That’s what he settled on as an answer. He’d thought about this pretty obsessively for the last few days – there was no telling in hindsight who those guys might have been, especially because he’d blocked out so much, made his memory selective. Little things kept coming back to him, never enough to be sure where and when, and with whom, he could have fallen in love. It was all frustratingly blurry.

His mom, meanwhile, looked sour, his answer apparently not all that much to her liking.

“You might have? You don’t know?”

Blake shook his head in frustration.

“That’s what I’m trying to tell you. I don’t know. I’ll never know. I… I suppressed everything before it could get somewhere.”

He wasn’t explaining this well. But in hindsight, it was a baffling thing to him, especially the part where it had worked for so long, with hardly any moments of doubt.

Until Adam had – unwittingly –  waltzed all over his self-deceit.

“But…what made you do that? I didn’t… we didn’t take any standpoint on this,” his momma said carefully, and suddenly, Blake was ready to explode.

‘That’, ‘this’, ‘it’. There were words for this, and damn it, he was going to use them.

“I did never get the feeling one of us being gay would be especially welcome, either. And nobody even used the word ‘bisexual’, as far as I recall.”

Just with that little word, ‘us’, the memory of Richie was in the room with them, making them both pause for a second. What would Richie have thought about having a mostly gay brother? It was an exercise in futility, trying to imagine it.

“You did ask me once, about being gay.”

She sounded sure of herself, on solid ground, and Blake knew she’d not messed anything up at that point. He remembered that pivotal moment with astonishing clarity. But as much as he blamed himself for his childish conclusions, which had been all his own, he also remembered what Adam had said about reevaluating, and yes, there should have been moments that would have facilitated that. He couldn’t think of a single one.

They did get into a fight because of it, Blake quietly angry, his mom shouting, which prompted his stepdad to look in on them. As angry as she was, she sent Mike away with a “I’ll explain later”, and Blake was grateful for that at least.

She was trying to defend herself, making everything a hundred times worse – it was ‘not something commonly talked about’, there was no need to ‘give anybody ideas’…

Blake rarely raised his voice, but at that last one he got loud.

“No one needed to ‘give me ideas’. They came on their own. It is not something to choose at will, and I should know, because I tried that. And it definitely isn’t something to be pitied for!”

Just as quickly as the fight had escalated, she deflated, with a quiet little ‘oh’.

“You thought people would… or I would…”

“Yes.”

There were lines on her face, all of a sudden – it was rarely visible to Blake that she’d grown old, but right at this moment it was striking, and all the fight he’d still had in him left him as well.

“You were always too stubborn for your own good,” his momma said softly. It didn’t sound at all like she was criticizing him. In the same tone of voice, she continued,

“I’ll say it again. So you know. I am happy for you.”

And just like that, there were tears in Blake’s eyes. He hadn’t expected those.

He drew her into an embrace to hide his face, and noticed, feeling a little guilty about it, that she was shaking.

 

“So. Adam.” his momma finally ventured, pulling back and breaking the silence that had stretched for quite a while. It had been soothing, had served to calm their breaths.

“Yeah.”

It felt good to smile again.

“He’s back at the ranch.”

His mom smiled back, and the mood changed again.

“You’re not stayin’ for dinner, then?”

Blake stared at her in shock. He hadn’t planned ahead, hadn’t thought beyond this conversation, but there was no way he would be staying and leaving Adam alone for the evening, she was right about that. What had given him pause, however, was more how she’d said it. There was no judgment, or if there was, it sounded like approval, and the knowing look had made a comeback.

“I guess not, no, but, I mean, I… we plan on being in Tish for a while. I could come back in a few days.”

His mum tilted her head and laid a hand on his arm, looking up at him.

“Oh, you’ll have to bring him with you, of course.”

Before Blake could think of something to say, she was already dragging him out to the garden, where, before he left, she absolutely needed to show him her new bench that Mike had made for her. Blake tagged along sluggishly, a bit dazed, but pretty happy, that was for sure.

 

~---~

 

Night was already falling when Blake parked the car. In the end he’d left later than he would have wanted to.

His house lay in darkness and quiet, the loudest sound coming from the leaves he was crushing with his boots as he walked up to the front porch.

The stillness made him immediately uneasy.

Had Adam fallen asleep?

He could not, would not have left, now would he?

No.

There he was, sitting on the front steps, a silhouette in the dim light. Hazy, almost unreal.

The closer Blake came, the more solid Adam became, gaining contours, until there was hardly any doubt anymore that this was a man of flesh and blood, not some specter, some woodland phantom.

_He’d mock me relentlessly for such silly thoughts._

Adam looked up, and the last vestiges of the strange aura that he’d been shrouded in fell away.

“Hey.”

He said it softly, and though he looked calm and still, it sounded anxious. Blake had been almost giddy all the way back, but now he only lowered himself down on the step beside Adam, without saying a word. Immediately, Adam let his head fall on Blake’s shoulder. That felt good; felt as it should be.

Until now, Blake hadn’t realized how emotionally drained he was from earlier. He closed his eyes for a second or two.

“Fuck, say something.”

Adam suddenly spoke up again, anxiety still prominent in his voice, and Blake felt like an ass. He forged ahead without thinking about it first.

“It went well, really. I mean, there was a bit of shouting – “

He broke off again quickly, because he felt the tension traveling through Adam’s body.

“No, no. I’m sayin’ this all wrong. She’s happy for us and she wants us to come to dinner. There.”

Hands framed his face and turned his head, so that they were looking each other in the eyes. The skeptical look on Adam’s face almost made Blake laugh.

“It’s true. Come on, you’ve met her, did you really think –“

“I didn’t know what to think.”

Adam’s eyes drifted to the ground. His voice had a slightly whining quality to it, but Blake didn’t have it in him to feel annoyed by that anymore.

“I had too much time on my hands, and my mind can get pretty creative imagining the strangest things.”

Blake ruffled Adam’s shower-damp hair, which sparked a half-hearted sound of protest.

“Well,” he drawled, “your hair still looks the same. But if you got bored, there must be something. A new tattoo maybe?”

“Haha. Funny.”

Adam looked up again, and there was something in his eyes that hit Blake hard, made his heart beat wildly. He was transfixed.

“I’m an idiot,” he murmured, because how had he ever managed to tell himself that this didn’t exist? And for years at that.

“Sure, always.”

The smug grin made another appearance, and the world was suspended no longer.

Time moved again.

“Oh, shut up.”

Adam already had his mouth open for a reply, but Blake moved in for a kiss. Hard, and drawn out. That was all he needed to get him going; within seconds his jeans felt way too tight.

And those moans that were coming out of Adam’s mouth were _filthy_.

Not breaking the kiss, Blake pulled him up, hoisted him up on his hips. Adam went willingly, and, oh god, the way that his body pressed against Blake’s. Blake stumbled and almost crashed them into the wall instead of pushing the door open.

He made it by a hair’s breadth, Adam squeaking, “What are you doing?”, then giggling hysterically.

“What are _you_ doing to _me_ , would be a much more appropriate question,” Blake rumbled, and Adam seemed to like the sound of that. He buried his face in Blake’s neck, making him sway dangerously yet again.

Somehow, they made it to a bedroom without turning a light on and without wrecking anything or hurting themselves in the process. A small miracle, Blake thought, as he laid Adam down on the sheets carefully, suddenly reverent where they’d been wild before.

He loved this man, and right here, right now, nothing else mattered.

“Fuck, we’re so gay,” Adam stage-whispered, once again proving his talent for breaking the moment.

Why was he doing that, anyway?

“Does this make you uncomfortable?” Blake murmured, trying to trap Adam with an intense gaze, feeling satisfied when it worked.

“What? Being gay? Of course not. That would be kind of stupid, given what we’re doing.”

Adam talked a lot when he got nervous.

“Stop deflecting.”

_I think you know that’s not what I was asking. But I’ll spell it out for you if you want me to._

“It’s like you’re allergic to sincerity.”

As he said it, Blake realized that wasn’t it exactly, and realized at the same time he shouldn’t have said anything. _He’s still afraid of getting hurt. And he won’t want me to know._

“I’m afraid of getting hurt.”

_Well, apparently wrong on that last count._

Adam was looking up at him earnestly, his eyes round and dark, and his honesty was disarming. Blake brushed a soft kiss against his temple.

“I… I can’t promise I won’t. I mean I’ll try my best not to, but I…”

He couldn’t go on. His voice gave out just like that, and he drew in a sharp breath. Adam tugged at him, and Blake stopped holding himself up, collapsed on top of him, rolled over onto his side before his full weight could land on Adam.

Adam went with the movement, clinging on.

“See. You shouldn’t have. Shouldn’t have asked.” he whispered, and Blake pulled himself together.

“I’m afraid I’ll screw it up,” he finished his thought.

_And just as afraid as you are that I’ll get hurt. I just don’t know how to hold back any part of my stupid heart._

Maybe Adam heard some of the unsaid words. In any case, he moved out of Blake’s arms – _no, don’t_ – but only to sit up and smile down at him.

“You know, I don’t think you will.”

With a quick movement, he leant over to straddle Blake, and oh, right, they had been –

“And now I’ll make you stop talking. You might get us sidetracked again otherwise.”

Blake saw no reason to object.

Not to Adam pulling off his clothes, not to Adam putting on a bit of a show disrobing for him, not to Adam pressing a hundred kisses to his skin, not to Adam’s lips moving around his dick. Not to a finger up his ass, the feeling still a bit weird but already deliciously familiar. Definitely not to Adam putting his tongue _there_.

“Go ahead. Fuck me,” Blake croaked, completely out of breath, his voice going much higher than he was used to.

Adam looked down at him and slowly shook his head.

Before Blake could even get his head together enough to protest, Adam pressed a condom into Blake’s hand, and reached for the bottle of lube again, coating his fingers and… reaching behind himself, his eyes fluttering closed, an adorable look of concentration on his face, and, oh god, he was…

“Let me do that.”

Adam’s eyes flew open.

“You want to?”

What kind of a question was that?

“Damn right I want to.”

 _Or at least let me see, fuck, I want to see what you’re doing to yourself…_ But Adam was already giving him a smile, kind of a shy one, and letting himself fall face down on the mattress.

The inked artwork of his skin contrasted with the white sheets, and Blake couldn’t not trace the lines with his fingertips again, before slowly, so slowly, drawing a lube-coated finger through the crack of that firm piece of ass.

“Uuuuh…”

Adam made a strange noise that coincided with a full-body shudder.

 _Beautiful_.

He must have whispered it, because Adam huffed.

“Get on with it, you old romantic.”

Blake did.

There wasn’t much that could be more sexy than watching his fingers disappear one by one, and move in and out, except of course –

He searched for the condom with his free hand, finally found it, had to use both hands to rip the wrapping it open. Adam made a little whining sound as Blake pulled his fingers out.

He hurried and fumbled with the condom, and his breath left him in one big rush when he saw Adam’s hips moving a little. He was rubbing himself off against the sheets.

_Fuck, that is hot._

Blake placed a hand on Adam’s hip, and Adam made a small embarrassed noise and stilled, then quickly pushed himself up on hands and knees. _Oh yes, perfect_.

_Not going to last, though._

Maybe he pushed in a bit too fast because of that; there was a little resistance, and a yelp from Adam, and Blake would have stopped, if not for the “Go on,” Adam hissed through gritted teeth.

It did feel incredible, and he had just enough presence of mind to listen for other potential sounds of distress. None came, instead Adam pushed back, and Blake lost it. He pulled out almost completely and drove in. Hard.

There was definitely a bit of pain mixed in at the drawn out “Aaaah” that escaped Adam, but also an immediate plea to “Continue! Don’t you dare stop.”

Again, Blake did as he was told; couldn’t do anything else, really.

The heat, the pressure, just a little longer, is it good for him, please let it be good for him, change the angle, come on, yeah, right, he likes that, oh fuuuuuu – Adam clenched down and simply forced the orgasm out of him.

Blake slumped against Adam’s back, immediately boneless, and felt it with his full body as Adam stiffened and came a few seconds later.

He probably should move away, he thought. His considerable weight was resting on Adam’s back, his cock softening inside him. But Adam immediately protested when he stirred; and made a contented sound as soon as he abandoned the attempt to get up.

 _Okay_.

At length, something occurred to him.

He pushed a little more against Adam, really trapping him with his weight, and murmured, his voice rough,

“Did you get off on this?”

Immediately, he felt ridiculous for having asked. Adam, however, squirmed, and his answer sounded defensive.

“I told you before: I like how big you are.”

“Didn’t believe you,” Blake heard himself reply, always half-asleep after sex and therefore dangerously honest.

“Well, I keep telling you you’re an idiot,” Adam gave back, sounding just as exhausted, and not at all insulting, but instead very fond again.

Somehow, Blake managed to pull out and dispose of the condom without making too much of a mess. Adam unceremoniously wiped himself off with his t-shirt, retrieved from the shapeless pile of clothes on the floor, then pulled Blake to the left side of the bed.

“Damp spot over there,” he explained, seemingly about to drift off. He pulled one of Blake’s arms over his shoulder and leaned his head on Blake’s chest, and then he was asleep.

As tired as he’d been, Blake lay awake for a while, relishing the feeling of steady breaths against his skin.

 

~---~

 

Blake woke up to the smell of pancakes.

That couldn’t be right; he knew for sure he had no eggs in his fridge. They’d bought a whole trunkload full of food yesterday on their way to the ranch, but they’d forgotten the eggs.

He had to be wrong about the pancakes.

There was definitely some noise coming from the kitchen, though, so that’s where Adam had to be at. Blake picked up yesterday’s clothes from the floor, opened the cupboard to take out another basically identical set, and went for a shower.

“How?” he asked, when he came into the kitchen ten minutes later to find a plate stacked with pancakes, practically drenched in maple syrup.

Adam pulled out his best smug grin, but then shrugged and looked somewhat uncertain.

“I went and bought eggs this morning, ‘cause, if you’d care to remember, you bitched about not being able to have pancakes for breakfast. Honestly, you could have bought some in Ada yesterday, would have spared me the trip.”

He didn’t sound annoyed at all, and Blake suspected that might have something to do with Adam wanting to take his truck for a drive. And without even asking him beforehand.

Still, it was a very sweet gesture.

“So, you made me my favorite breakfast? Who’s the romantic now?”

It was truly lovely how Adam managed to look embarrassed and exasperated at the same time.

“Oh, shut your cakehole.”

They grinned at each other, remembering an old joke, and Blake moved in for a hearty kiss before they tugged in.

 

There were always things to do around a house that had been empty for a while, and he’d gotten up late, so Blake left Adam to his own devices for the rest of the morning.

Around noon, he found Adam in the living room, staring at his phone dubiously.

“What are you doing?”

He was used to getting to see a smile when Adam looked up at him. It was different now, though, had become almost achingly bright.

But when Adam answered the question, a frown crept onto his face.

“Trying to figure out if this text is a joke or not.”

“Hm?”

“It’s from Jesse. ‘Hey, don’t want to disturb you or anything, I know you’ve run off with your Country boyfriend, but we need a confirmation on those dates for the video shoot. Just tell me if you’re still good with the 13th of December.’”

Blake felt his heart start to beat madly in his chest. Maybe those casual words, joking even, shouldn’t have been so much of a shock to his system, but they were. He really had to stop panicking every time there was even the suggestion of something having gotten out. He was planning to tell people, and soon, at that; had been entirely serious when he’d measured the time in weeks rather than months when they first talked about it. But hell, it made him want to throw up to even imagine all the things that could possibly come their way, that could be said about them, be said about _Adam_ …

 Okay. One thing at a time.

“You didn’t tell them yet.”

“No. I mean, I told them I’d be here. I don’t get why he’d…”

Adam looked so cute when he was confused. It somehow calmed Blake down entirely.

“So he’s joking, then.”

The simple answer, and not that surprising either. After all, there’d always been those kinds of jokes, and they had done nothing to discourage them. Quite the opposite.

There was no answer from Adam for a moment. He was looking intently at his phone, typing, scrolling…

Finally, he let out a loud “Hah!”

He held the display under Blake’s nose.

“Pictures from the airport. In L.A.. With some stupid bromance speculation, that no one is actually taking seriously.”

Alright. Much ado about nothing.

Something about Adam’s tone of voice bothered Blake, though.

“Only it is serious now,” he finally said quietly, and Adam looked up immediately, held his gaze, eyes shining, showing no trace of whatever flippancy or discomfort Blake had thought he’d identified in his voice just a few seconds before.

“Yeah. That it is.”

Blake was glad they were in agreement, and only slightly afraid of what he was getting into.

 

~---~

 

That night, Adam winced a little when he sat down on the veranda bench beside Blake to – ostensibly – share a beer and talk. They would also be able to watch the sunset, but Blake refrained from pointing it out, lest he be called a hopeless romantic again.

“Did’ya hurt yourself?” he asked automatically, noticing Adam’s grimace.

There was an ever so slight hesitation before the reply.

“Bit sore, actually.”

“Oh. Er… sorry.”

That was a bit mortifying, somehow.

“Nah…” Adam looked up from under his lashes, and Blake suspected he absolutely knew what kind of effect he was having on him by doing that.

“…I rather like it.”

Blake had probably never blushed so often in his life, not even as an awkward teenager, he reflected, as he tried and failed to come up with an appropriate or even inappropriate answer. His lack of a reaction made that infuriating, beloved man in front of him grin again.

“Speechless, Shelton?”

Now that, he knew how to answer.

“I’ll give you speechless.”

And he pulled Adam into a deep kiss, the sunset soon forgotten.

 

Later, he lay awake, watching Adam sleep.

There was a certain vulnerability to Adam, always present, like a hum in the background, but more pronounced as he was lying there, eyes closed, breath slow and steady.

For a second, he looked almost fragile, and Blake was struck all at once by the fact that he couldn’t always protect him (would not even be welcome to do so even if he could), and by the certainty that he would be devastated if something happened to him.

 _I have to do right by this one_ , he thought, flooded by a wave of tenderness, and brushed his fingers lightly over Adam’s messy hairline, then down his cheek.

_And that includes telling the world that I’m not ashamed of him. But first…_

A few more days, maybe weeks. A few more days before they’d go public and deal with the resulting craziness.

Just a few more days to themselves.

Then, he would be calling his record company to set up a series of sure to be uncomfortable meetings.

Then, he would work with Adam and their managers on putting out a statement – as much as he hated the very thought of it, and as depressing as the necessity of it might seem, Blake wasn’t naïve enough to believe that this particular issue didn’t need careful deliberation.

Then, he would have to deal with the fallout, whatever form it might take – angry fans, suddenly distant friends? – his mind was good at coming up with a variety of unappealing possibilities.

Then, in short, there would be enough time to worry.

For now, he allowed himself to be happy.

 

_Fin_

 

 

 

**Author's Note:**

> Please leave a comment if you feel like it, I really appreciate getting them!


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